


Tomorrow and Tomorrow

by littleshopofhoruss



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Timelines, Doomed Timelines, Everybody Kills Everybody, Gen, Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-10-20
Updated: 2013-10-31
Packaged: 2017-12-29 22:00:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,724
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1010615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littleshopofhoruss/pseuds/littleshopofhoruss
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>That's the problem with Paradox Space, in the end- it encompasses everything, every possibility. As bleak as the Alpha timeline looks, there's a thousand others where you die in some bloody, twisted way- and one where you are the killer.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Story of My Life

honk.  
HONK.  
honk.

WELL, BROTHER. HERE WE MOTHERFUCKING ARE.  
been through so much together, you and me.  
BEEN THROUGH ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING.  
from this flagrant fraudulence of an exile to that horror show we called a game.  
AND EVEN BEFORE, WHEN I WAS BLIND TO THE TRUTH OF EVERYTHING I CALLED A MIRACLE.  
all those false prophets being all up in my pan, telling me to take what i’d been given.  
WHEN ALL I HAD TO DO.  
was take it for myself.  
JUST UP AND STEAL WHAT THOSE SWILLBLOODED HERETICS WANTED TO KEEP FOR THEMSELVES.  
now we’ve got it all, don’t we?  
AND NOW WE DON’T EVEN GOT TO SHARE.  
no more lies, brother. only our truth in the miracles.  
HAHAHAHAHA.

don’t you be crying on me, brother.  
DRY THOSE TEARJERKING VISION SPHERES OF YOURS.  
ain’t no need to be spilling your shitbitching color on me.  
SPILLING ANY MORE THAN YOU NEED TO, BROTHER.  
and you deserve to spill a lot more.  
I FOUND OUT YOU WERE UP AND KICKING THE WICKED HERESIES UP WITH EVERYONE ELSE.  
spreading all the lies of the world, listening to them other shitbloods.  
AND FOR THAT ALONE YOU’RE BEING ALL KINDS OF WORTHY TO GET GUTTED.  
but i like you, tavbro.  
SO I’M HERE TO KEEP YOU ALIVE.  
and to tell you all them miraculous stories.  
AIN’T MUCH MORE TO BE DOING OUT UP IN HERE.  
not with just the two of us.  
COME ON, BROTHER. TAKE SOME UP IN YOUR HEARCHANNELS.

look at all the people who we got to help me out here.  
ALL THOSE MIRACULOUS LIARS THAT I UP AND MADE EXAMPLES OF.  
got old equibro.  
HIM BEING ARROGANT ENOUGH TO UP AND STAND BEFORE HIS MASTER.  
the little catsis.  
BONES THAT CRUNCH AND CRACK AND UP AND BE PAYING FOR HER SINS.  
our old pal karkat.  
THE KNIGHT OF BLOOD LEFT A FLOOD. WHERE IS HE NOW?  
even got a pretty little thing i know you want to see up like this.  
SENT THAT SPIDER SLICING THROUGH HER WEB OF WICKED LIES.

what do you say, tavbro?  
TAKE UP THE MOTHERFUCKING PAINT WITH ME.  
we’ll tell our own stories up against the past with these heathens.

I’M NOT HERE TO BE TAKING NO FOR AN ANSWER, BROTHER.  
and silence ain’t all that far from no.  
SAY SOMETHING FOR ME AND I’LL BEING UP TO KEEP YOU SAFE.

nothing to say?

THEN YOU’VE MADE YOUR MOTHER FUCKING CHOICE.  
i would have kept you safe with me and taught you all up on the world’s miracles.  
BUT SINCE YOU DON’T WANT ANY OF THESE WICKED RIGHTEOUSNESSES.  
i’ll keep them all for myself.

HONK.  
honk.


	2. Tengo La Camisa Negra

“Vriska.”  
“Shit! Tavros, what are you doing here?”  
“Exactly what you think I am. I’m done with you, Vriska.”  
“Look, I’m glad you decided to grow a spine and all, but in case you haven’t noticed, we kind of have a situation here!”  
“I know. But I’m not running from this one.”  
“Are you out of your mind? Everyone’s dying over here, and you’ve got to get down before-”  
“Shut up. I know that.”  
“So-”  
“And I don’t think I’m the one in any danger here.”  
“Oh… oh god.”  
“Finally she picks up on it.”  
“You’re not.”  
“I am.”  
“Calm down, there’s no need to get hasty here-”  
“Hasty? This isn’t hasty! There’s a reason I saved you for last, you know.”  
“Hahaha, come on, Tavros. Very funny, you can put down your lance now. “  
“Shut up. I’m done taking shit from you, Serket. Your time here is up.”  
“Yeah, that line’s not clichéd at all. Gonna tell me your daring plan to take over the world while you’re at it?”  
“You get so angry when you’re afraid, Vriska. It’s funny how that works. Someone backs you into a corner, and even though you only want to hide, you start to lash out.”  
“What do you mean, trying to spin this around onto me? I wasn’t the one who went batshit and started stabbing people!”  
“Deny it all you want, Vriska. I just wanted you to look at me and see what I’ve become.”  
“I didn’t make you into a murderer, Tavros!”  
“You didn’t. I did all of this on my own. But you always did want me to get a backbone, didn’t you?”  
“Not by killing all of our friends! Listen, I don’t care what you have planned for me. This ends now.”  
“You’d like it to, wouldn’t you? You’re looking for a way out, and you think you’ve found it, hm? Your little ace in the hole?”  
“Ace in the- what are you talking about?”  
“I just had an… interesting little talk with Aradia before I came up here. And it turns out that even though she couldn’t reset the timeline properly now that we’re beyond the game, her music boxes have gone conveniently missing.”  
“Well, fuck subtlety, then. Yes, I’ve got them. What are you going to do?”  
“Not much self-preservation, I see. Aradia told me an awful lot before she gave up the ghost- which I guess would be literally here. This far out from the alpha timeline, trying to travel back would destroy her. Forget about another player. If you’re going back to warn people, you’re just setting yourself up for a suicide mission.”  
“Look, that doesn’t matter! You killed my best friends! If there’s anything I can do to keep Terezi from dying, I’ll do it.”  
“You just don’t get it, do you? It’s not going to work for you. It’s not going to work for anyone. You’ve got no way out of this mess.”  
“But damned if I won’t try, bastard!”  
“Why, Vriska. I’ve never heard you say something so…heroic.”  
“What’s that supposed to-”

“Adios, spiderbitch. Glad to see you’re finally as scared of me as I was of you.”


	3. Fate and Fae

Once upon a time, there was a daring Thief, as beautiful as she was cunning and as quick with her dice as with a biting wit. That is to say, she was the best, and in all the games she played, she stole her way to the top, leaving her rivals stunned in her wake. Yet above all, there was one enemy who she longed to match wits with- the one who had thrown her and her closest friends into exile, the green-fired black dog who had cast her into hell. For days and weeks she plotted her revenge, carefully tracing a path that would bring her triumphant to his doom. Though careful meddling in the alchemy of the universe, she created her enemy and readied herself in her quest to destroy him, and her victory seemed all but certain.

Yet one day, she chanced across the Witch who she had befriended in her exile, and the luck that seemed to follow her everywhere vanished. Excited that her plans to destroy her nemesis would come to fruition so soon, she slipped a few precious details of her plan to the Witch. The Witch- while she did not hold the grasp on the sight of what was to come- was troubled by the hints the Thief had spilled, and she left to confide in the blind Seer her suspicions. The Seer nodded as she listened, and as soon as the Witch had finished telling her tale, she called for the Knight and arrant Heir to find the Thief-her own sister- and lock her away before she could act.

The Thief, bound in her cell, raged that her plan might not come to pass, so she waited silently for the guard to change. Her first days went slowly, as she was ever watched by the Seer herself and her favored aide, the Knight. The Heir and an untamed Rogue took their turns, and the Thief was not a fool enough to try and act against them. The Seer was careful to keep the Page and Mage- who had both fallen beneath the sway of her influence before- far from her cell, and the Thief feared that she might never find a guard who would set her free from her unjust throes of her captivity.

Fortune found her once again, however, for one day the Seer chanced to assign the foolish Bard to watch over her cell. She had heard from the Rogue (who always loved to chat and gossip, even with her prisoners) that the Bard had been indulging less in such substances that would addle his brains, and the Seer had finally judged him fit enough to watch over the Thief. Yet the night he was assigned to watch over her, he fell back into his old ways, devouring so much of the mind-softening stuff to make him putty in her very hands. She spoke quietly to him as he drowsed against the door of her cell, promising him that if he slipped a handful of sapphires into her cell, she would multiply them manifold and let him keep them all for himself. The foolish, greedy Bard happily agreed and grabbed eight of the gems from the shelf they sat on. He slipped them through the bars of her door and waited for the riches that would come. Yet as the Thief sliced the way through the door with a blade she had spun from the gems, swathed in her favored shades of black and blue, the only reward she gave to the Bard was a quick death, lopping his head from his body with a quick slice. 

Charging silently through the labyrinths of the place they had all been exiled, the Thief searched for her traitorous sister. Though she still wished to finish off her old enemy, the thought of taking revenge on all who stood in her way flooded her path until she was consumed by it. She found the Seer and plunged a dagger into her chest, twisting it out roughly before the Knight could move to defend her. The Knight was wrested from life with a similar, brutal speed before the Thief took her leave to find her other former guards. The Rogue she turned against the Heir, and the Mage she set once again upon the Maid who he once loved- before she bade the Rogue and Mage duel until they both lay dead. She gutted the Witch for speaking of her plans to the Seer, and she gutted the Prince for defending her. The Page-who had at long last found the courage to rise against the Thief’s meddlesome ways- was cast from the window of the highest floor, little more than a bother to the Thief so empowered by anger. Just as she reached the door to the roof of the fortress- where she planned to make her flight from exile to kill off her old nemesis- she heard a noise shuffling behind her. Wild with panic and fury, she flung her sword at the interloper and spun as the blade sunk deep into flesh with a sickening noise.  


There behind her stood the swaying body of her oldest friend, the Sylph, already growing pale and wan. In exile, the Thief had grown from this airy spirit, but still held enough pity deep within her heart to feel remorse for what she had done. With tears in her eyes, the Thief rushed to the Sylph’s side, shrieking and begging the fates that she would not die.

The Sylph’s eyes were already clouding with the shadows of death as the Thief neared her, yet she still struggled to stand. The Thief caught her before her legs gave way beneath her, and she clutched the Sylph against her, begging that it was not so. Breathily, the Sylph struggled to whisper a few precious words to the Thief, but she could not manage to thrust them past the blood bubbling on her lips. Finally, with the last of her strength, she reached for the Thief’s head and pulled it closer to their own, locking their mouths in a final embrace. The Thief pulled her ever closer, feeling the power of love course through her, strong enough to pull her from the arms of death.

Yet it was not enough. The Sylph fell away, and the Thief felt tears brim from her eyes as the cool, acrid taste of blood faded from her mouth. The power of love, she realized, could only overcome the power of anger before anger can grow. With nothing more of just or heroic cause in the universe, she cradled the body of the Sylph- who loved silently and from the shadows, when the Thief was too great a fool to realize it- and knelt to the floor. There she stayed, her eyes trained on the starless sky, and she lived mournfully ever after.


	4. And You'll Get It

Dry, dry. He’s all dry. Nothing more to have of his violet swill. She plunges her fangs in deeper, drawing out the last few drops of blood from the gashes crossing over his neck as his body twitches out another final spasm.

He gave up, falling limp and shuddering with each new bite.

His hands scratched across her back, but she would never let a meal go so easily. He tried to aim another desperate blow at her head, this time with one of her own bottles. Without removing her mouth from its latest wound, she caught his arm with a free hand, twisting until it cracked.

With a gasp- with a snarl- she was on him, carving her name into him with every motion of her fangs, even as he danced beneath her, trying to escape them. Every drop of violet she caught, some in those flasks with gaping mouths, some with her bare hands, and some with her starving mouth.

She turns to him, and he falls away, something gutteral and stuttering bubbling over his blubbering.

She paid no attention and walked past him, to where his wand had rolled in his panic. With a casual step, the snapped it in two, and the shield splintered down the seams of his frame.

She spun, she shone, and the wand fell from his grip. He shrieked at her, his confidence- and protection- unwavering as he aimed a fist at her in primal retaliation.  
He reached the top of the stairs, close enough to her that he could have clamped his hand on the back of her chair if he had the chance.

He was getting closer, chanting white words of lost logic, crossing each caesura with another mutter as he stepped in rhythm. A shield, she recognized. Flush against the body and too durable for fangs to pierce. A good, strong piece of science which she really shouldn’t have taught him. No matter. It took a fair amount of concentration to hold it that close to himself. A distraction would be easy enough.

She swiveled in her chair, turning her back to the noise and dimming her glow as she had practiced.

Something clattered at opposite end of the hall, and her pupils narrowed. A few honks and a scattering of cursing. Naturally, it would be him. So this was the end.  
Now she was down to that last lucky bastard.

It drove her mad, the waiting, but she became quite patient, dragging on for weeks before daring to take another victim. All too late it occurred to her to drain the bodies, to bottle the blood up, to save some of her stash for later.

What a waste it had been, she mused, those first few feedings driven by the instinct of a predator. She awoke in the solitude of exile, craving blood and devouring the first blind fool to cross her path, tearing out her throat in chunks and lapping the blood from each piece. With no one to investigate, the others fell to panic, but she cooled their fear, waiting until they had almost forgotten to temper her thirst again.

With a dejected sigh, she swirled the empty flask, as if the crusted drops of indigo and scarlet would bubble back to life and soothe that burning hunger in the back of her throat. Scattered around her lay a trail of empty glass vials, each drained of the contents she had carelessly stashed. The quasi-throne crafted from rich velvet cradled her luminescent body as she lounged in idle frustration, surveying the metal-paneled walls she claimed as her palace.

She needed a drink.


End file.
